Additional deer suspected to be positive for CWD throughout Michigan

WLNS – With the complete deer season of firearms, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources has identified a total of 30 white-tailed deer that have been confirmed or suspected to have a chronic wasting disease. Several thousand additional samples are waiting for Michigan State University, so the numbers this season could still change.

Since May 2015, when the first CWD deer was found, the DNR has tested approximately 23,000 deer. Of those tested, 30 cases of CWD have been suspected or confirmed in deer from Clinton, Ingham, Kent and Montcalm counties. "Suspected CWD" means that the deer tested positive for an initial screening test, but has not yet been confirmed by additional testing. It is very rare that a CWD suspect is not confirmed as a CWD-positive animal, but it is possible.

From 201

5 to 2016, a total of four deer in Clinton County tested positive.

So far, in 2017, a single CWD suspect has been identified in Westphalia Township, also in Clinton County. In Ingham County, five Meridian Township deer tested positive from 2015 to 2016; Since then, no deer in Ingham County has tested positive for CWD.

In Montcalm County, it is suspected or confirmed that a total of 17 deer from the following municipalities are positive for CWD: Cato, Douglass, Fairplain, Maple Valley, Montcalm, Pine, Reynolds, Sidney and Winfield.

In the county of Kent, three CWD-positive deer were found in the municipalities of Nelson and Spencer. This is the first year in which CWD deer are found in the counties of Montcalm or Kent.

For more information about CWD and the current known distribution of CWD in Michigan, visit michigan.gov/cwd. The results are updated weekly.